As Buffy slammed the front door loudly behind her, Tara and the potentials assembled in the back yard, all except one.
From her bedroom overlooking the yard, Kennedy watched as Tara guided the potentials through a gentle warm up, each one responding to her guidance immediately.
Gritting her teeth as Tara rushed to aid Louise, a new potential who had arrived the day before, and who had just mistaken an instruction and turned into the swinging fist of Rona, Kennedy strode away from the window and made her way down the stairs.
Opening the back door, she stood on the porch and continued studying the training method of the blonde.
Louise joined her at the small garden table and wiped at her bleeding nose gingerly.
"Why are you up here?" Kennedy asked.
"I got punched, I'm bleeding." Louise said sadly. She was still trying to adjust to her calling and the craziness of the new life she had found herself a part of.
Kennedy turned to her, a quizzical expression on her face.
"So what?!" she said quietly, causing Louise to turn and stare at her.
"S-sorry?"
"You got punched, so what?" Kennedy repeated. "You think that the vampires and demons and bringers are going to stop once you get punched? You think you'll get a 'time-out' in the upcoming fight?!"
Shaking her head, Kennedy returned her gaze to the training session going on before her.
"But, Tara said…."
"Oh, the great and wonderful Tara said!" Kennedy cut in quickly, her over dramatic gesture hushing anything else the new potential had to say.
From behind her, a voice cut Kennedy off quickly, its location and tone startling her. "Yes, I said. And what I said is that we will work more on her technique!" Tara injected.
Turning in her seat, Kennedy glared at the blonde before getting to her feet and facing up to the woman before her. "You think you're so great don't you, think you can walk in and take away everything that was mine!"
Tara rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Kennedy, look! I'm not going to keep going over and over this with you. I haven't taken anything away from you. I never asked to come back and I never asked or expected Willow to come back to me."
Kennedy opened her mouth to speak but Tara continued before she had a chance.
"There are bigger things going on than you and your petty vendettas, unless you haven't realised, The First is coming, it's coming to destroy you and me, and all these girls!" She said, gesturing to the potentials. "And if you're not on the wagon, then you should get the hell out of Sunnydale and hope that your constant whining and spoilt brat attitude is enough to stop the bringers killing you!" Tara yelled.
With one final glare, Kennedy turned and stormed back into the house.
"And you still need to train! You're not above this! None of us are!" Tara called after her, her only acknowledgement being the slamming of a door somewhere in the house.
Turing back to the rest of the now startled and slight nervous looking potentials, Tara smiled apologetically.
"Right now ladies, where were we?"
As darkness fell over Sunnydale, Buffy returned to the Summers home. Having found both Giles and Wood, she had sat the pair down and discussed their issues with the forthcoming battle and Spike.
Having managed to come to somewhat fraught agreement, everyone managed to draw a line in the sand under the issue and managed to agree to move forward. Unfortunately, moving forward in Robin Woods eyes meant firing the slayer from her post at Sunnydale High.
As she entered the house, Buffy was surprised to find a sense of calm over the place.
"Hello?" She called out "Anybody home?"
Silence was her only response and she hung her coat on the hook before walking cautiously into the kitchen.
"Hello?" she asked again.
"Hey Buffy!" Dawn greeted her cheerfully, causing the usually sharp and alert slayer to jump noticeably.
"Hey Dawnie!" Buffy smiled warmly, her eyes taking in the strong, young woman that her baby sister had become. "Where is everyone?"
Dawn shrugged and took a large bite of what Buffy assumed was an anchovy and jelly sandwich. "They're in the basement with Anya and Tara going over some battle plans and stuff." she said nonchalantly before turning back to the dining room table and taking her seat amongst a huge pile of files and folders.
The slayer smiled sadly at her sisters turned back, realising that the brave young woman who had been a huge, if somewhat unexpected part of her life was possibly going to die. The thought drew a lump into her throat and she fought to swallow the fear.
Pulling open the basement door, she smiled as the sounds of a heated debate, possibly lead by Anya filled her ears.
Willow had been driving for almost 5 hours, an accident on I5 just outside Anaheim had backed the road up for almost 3 of the 5 hours and she was hot, annoyed and wanted nothing more than to curl up in Tara's arms and go to sleep.
Unfortunately, she still had at least another hour of driving before she reached home but since leaving behind the accident and Anaheim, the roads had all been pretty clear and were flowing freely.
As Sunnydale loomed closer, she turned onto a little used road and sighed, taking in the eerie silence that had bled into the town since the arrival of The First.
From her left, a beat up pick-up truck emerged from a dirt road and she smiled sadly. A large portion of Sunnydale residents had already moved away, sensing a change in their surrounds and succumbing to the fear that penetrated everything and everyone, so the sight of another vehicle on the road both warmed and saddened her.
Slowing slightly to allow a safe stopping distance from the truck, Willow wondered idly how things had been between Tara and Kennedy while she'd been away. She hoped that her binding spell had been enough to keep Tara's primal savagery in check.
As they turned towards the home straight, Willow squinted slightly, it appeared to her that the occupants of the truck were having some sort of debate and she wondered what it was about driving that made people lose their cool. On the highways and interstates it was a little more understandable, but the road was clear and surrounded by woods, all of which were reasonably calming on the soul.
Following the truck around a bend, Willow slammed on the brakes as the trucks door opened and a young woman was pushed from the truck, rolling over and over on the harsh asphalt before coming to a halt.
Leaping from the car, she rushed towards the woman. "Are you OK? Can you hear me?" she asked, rolling the stricken woman over. "Can you talk?"
Turning back towards the car and her passenger Willow called out;
"This girl's bleeding badly. We have to get her to the hospital!"
Stepping into the beams of the cars headlights, Faith regarded the girl with a disinterested certainty. "Yep. Guess I'm back in Sunnydale." she said.